Wishful Slacker

A nice day for a ride!

Meet Gary Fisher, my gorgeous new bicycle. 

Those of you that know my husband know that he has been an avid cyclist for a very long time now.  He got into city riding here in Chicago a couple years ago, and once the city cycling bug hit him there was no turning back.  He now rides into work every day in almost every type of weather aside from torrential rain and blizzard.  He varies his route each day, either taking the quiet neighborhood streets, sticking to the busier thoroughfares, or venturing over to the the lakefront path.

Then he comes home to his wife, who has not been on a bike in at least 5 years and has feared the thought of riding on the street in traffic.  Or along the lakefront path, where we have seen numerous accidents and collisions between bikers and runners.  Hmmm...I was content to give that a pass. 
  
But, over time, I must say, I started warming up to the idea of it all, especially now that we live in Roscoe Village with its wider and quieter neighborhood streets.  My husband found some great blogs about city cycling, most notably Let's Go Ride a Bike, written by two women, one in Chicago and the other in Nashville.  Their blog, written to promote biking, is all about how city riding can be done leisurely and without stress, AND without sacrificing fashion.  Check it out- it's really cool.  Just as I began feeling up to the idea of it all, my birthday arrived, along with an offer from my husband that we go out and get me a bike. 

And this is how my Gary Fisher entered my life.

Jim also added to his bike collection this past month with this beautiful Civia Loring, allowing him a new leisurely option to consider in the mornings instead of always taking out his fast-paced and trusty Surly.

Since I've been feeling like death warmed-over the past couple months, poor Gary Fisher has been relegated to our spare bedroom while the Surly and Civia have gotten to go out.  Poor Gary.  But finally, this morning, the weather was perfect and I was feeling pretty good, so out we went for a warm up run through the neighborhood.  It was great!  After riding around for a bit, we stopped off at Wishbone for breakfast, and from there went to ride home.  Only it felt so nice to be out on this beautiful day, feeling the breeze and sensing the quiet of this Sunday morning, that I wanted to keep going!  Which we did, weaving through the streets around Roscoe and up north of Addision into North Center, and over into the Southport Corrider. 

Now this was the way to enjoy a Sunday morning, sitting outside at Wishbone! Our bikes got to flirt with each other while we ate

I was happy to have Jim leading the way, helping me get used to the added awareness one needs of traffic and pedestrians.  I started to really get the hang of it- and at least felt like I got off to a good start!  And my body, which has literally engaged in NO physical activity these past few months, shrieked with joy, "Thank GOD, we're moving again!"

On-call crazy!

As of today, I am happy to report that my on-call reign at work is over halfway done.  Three-fifths completed.  Six-tenths.  Twelve-twentieths.  Sixty percent.  But who's counting? 

I went into this on-call period with no meal or grocery shopping preparation, and this has had dire consequences.  Even grocery shopping through Peapod has seemed too laborious a task.  Today I subsisted on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich made with the leftover heels of a loaf of bread (therefore making it about 2 inches in diameter), and two apples.  And, seeing as I used up the bread, this is no longer even an option for tomorrow.  My husband, who usually rallies for us during these times, is equally grocery-lethargic this week.  So, alas, we're relying on carry out options that have the promise of leftovers.  When I could not resist my continuous stomach grumblings at 4 pm today, I reached for the only snack I had at work--- fig newtons.  This is humorous because it was only last night that I vowed to stay away from figs for some time.  We probably ate about 4 pounds of figs and fig products over the weekend at our Iron Chef Battle Fig party.  Having to rectify today's moment of hypoglycemic panic with a fig newton gave me a chuckle...in a frenzied, slightly manic way.  It probably sounded more like a cackle. 

It makes me wonder how on earth I made it through graduate school, when I had such little time to cook and an empty wallet.  What I do remember is that there were plenty of tator tots.   

Part of the reason why we haven't devoted any weekend time to stocking up on food is that we've used these moments attending some really fun events the past couple weekends, definitely helping to ease the work dread that frequently oozes over me on Sundays (and yes, one of these fun times involved seeing The Wiggles).  Thrown into this weekend was a new arrival to our home- my husband's newly assembled bike, using a new bike frame and his old retro bike parts.  It's awesome.  And, Jim also won second place in Battle Fig with his Vanilla Bean Ice Cream with Fig Compote.  All in all, the guy had a very successful weekend!

Hanging with The Wiggles:

Taking in the Air and Water Show:

Filling up at Battle Fig (pictures shown are of Chris's lamb and fig skewers, which won first place, and Christina's Fig, Apple, and Fontina Cheese Crostini):

And, last but not least, the new Black Stallion!